itaibn0 comments on Mental Subvocalization --"Saying" Words In Your Mind As You Read - Less Wrong

9 Post author: Torello 15 February 2014 02:38AM

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Comment author: itaibn0 15 February 2014 10:40:15PM *  1 point [-]

That's strange. I thought I wouldn't be able to do it, but I tried and it turns out I can. It's difficult, though, and I'm not counting perfectly (there are repetitions and possibly skips). If I focus more on getting the counting right my reading ability degrades. I've also noticed on earlier occasions that I can read while listening to someone speak, this as well done imperfectly.

EDIT: I realised you might have meant to count loud out. I actually just counted in my head. I'm now trying to count to out loud (even while writing this comment 290.. 291... 292..) I can still read (and even write). It's hard, I sometimes have pauses in my counting and I read with noticeably less attention and speed.

380.. 381.. 382

Comment author: hylleddin 17 February 2014 09:10:05AM 0 points [-]

Huh, same here, it was much easier than I expected. Elsewhere in the comments, buybuydandavis noted a distinction between 'hearing' and 'saying', and I think that's what's going on here, for me it least. I say what I'm counting, but mostly hear what I'm reading.

I can't read while listening to someone, so at least somewhat different things are going on between us.

Comment author: itaibn0 09 March 2014 06:01:12PM 0 points [-]

I can't read while listening to someone, so at least somewhat different things are going on between us.

I tested this some more, and I'm not sure how much I can really do this. A large part of it seems to be reading in the gaps of speech when someone is speaking slowly or reading and not noticing I missed some portion of the speech.

Comment author: private_messaging 16 February 2014 10:05:44AM 0 points [-]

Perhaps we can use that as a gauge of sub-vocalization while reading, which would not be subject to different interpretations as much as the question whenever you sub-vocalize at all... i.e. if there is any interference between reading and counting out loud, then you subvocalize to some extent, if there's no interference then you don't subvocalize at all.